Rupert Murdoch tries to stop scandal with ad

Jill Lawless, Associated Press

Published
4:00 am PDT, Sunday, July 17, 2011

News Corporation Chief Rupert Murdoch speaks to the media after meeting the family of murdered British school girl Milly Dowler in London, on July 15, 2011. Rupert Murdoch will use advertisements in British national newspapers on Saturday to apologise for"serious wrongdoing" by his News of the World tabloid, News International said. TOPSHOTS/ less

News Corporation Chief Rupert Murdoch speaks to the media after meeting the family of murdered British school girl Milly Dowler in London, on July 15, 2011. Rupert Murdoch will use advertisements in British ... more

Photo: Ben Stansall, AFP/Getty Images

Photo: Ben Stansall, AFP/Getty Images

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News Corporation Chief Rupert Murdoch speaks to the media after meeting the family of murdered British school girl Milly Dowler in London, on July 15, 2011. Rupert Murdoch will use advertisements in British national newspapers on Saturday to apologise for"serious wrongdoing" by his News of the World tabloid, News International said. TOPSHOTS/ less

News Corporation Chief Rupert Murdoch speaks to the media after meeting the family of murdered British school girl Milly Dowler in London, on July 15, 2011. Rupert Murdoch will use advertisements in British ... more

Photo: Ben Stansall, AFP/Getty Images

Rupert Murdoch tries to stop scandal with ad

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London --

"We are sorry" the full-page ad began Saturday, as Rupert Murdoch tried to halt a phone-hacking scandal that has claimed two of his top executives with a gesture of atonement and promises to right the wrongs committed by his now-shuttered tabloid, News of the World.

Prime Minister David Cameron's Conservative-led government and the London police, meanwhile, faced increasing questions over their close relationship with Murdoch's media empire.

Cameron was feeling the heat Saturday after government records showed that Murdoch executives have held 26 meetings with him since he was elected in May 2010 and were invited to his country retreat. Senior police officers also had close ties to Murdoch executives, even hiring one as a consultant who has since been arrested in the phone-hacking and police bribery scandal rocking Murdoch's News Corp.

On Saturday, News Corp. ran an ad in seven British national newspapers with the headline "We are sorry." Signed by Murdoch, it apologized "for the serious wrongdoing that occurred."

A front-page headline in another Murdoch paper, the Times, called it a "Day of atonement."

Cameron has appointed a judge to conduct a inquiry into criminal activity at the News of the World and in the British media as he tries to distance the government from the scandal.

Foreign Secretary William Hague defended the government Saturday, saying "it's not surprising that in a democratic country, there is some contact between leaders" and media chiefs.

Hacking allegations

Murdoch began his apologies Friday as he met with the family of slain schoolgirl Milly Dowler, whose phone was hacked by the News of the World in 2002. The revelation that journalists had accessed her phone in search of scoops while police were looking for the missing 13-year-old fueled an explosion of interest in the long-simmering scandal. The 80-year-old mogul said "as founder of the company, I was appalled to find out what had happened and I apologized."

The phones of celebrities, royal aides, politicians and top athletes are also alleged to have been hacked, and police are investigating whether victims of London's 2005 terrorist bombings and the families of dead British soldiers were among the tabloid's targets.

British police are also under pressure to explain why their original hacking investigation failed to find the full scale of the wrongdoing. Detectives reopened the investigation earlier this year and now say they have the names of 3,700 potential victims.

The scandal claimed its first casualty among Murdoch's U.S. executives Friday when Hinton announced he was stepping down immediately as publisher of the Wall Street Journal and chief executive of Dow Jones & Co.

Murdoch is eager to stop the crisis from further spreading to the United States, where the FBI has opened an inquiry into whether 9/11 victims or their families were also hacking targets of News Corp. journalists.